Partner Emeritus, Urban Systems, Vancouver, BC

 
In a career spanning more than four decades, Catherine Berris has been at the forefront of her disciplines, building relationships, and innovating how to integrate GIS applications into environmental assessment and coastal zone planning work. Her project experience spans community and site planning; park, recreation, and trail planning and design; nature-based design solutions; urban forest strategies; coastal planning; visual assessment; and cemetery planning and design. Through this unique blend of practice areas, she helps her clients - who are mostly local governments and Indigenous communities - improve the health of their environments and their people. As an early adopter of community engagement, she continues to implement new tools and approaches for connecting with the public and stakeholders. Protecting and providing experiences of nature in the city are key passions for Berris; her nature-based approaches to stormwater management as a response to flooding caused by urban development were cutting edge. She is a consummate professional, guiding her own firm for decades and now leading at the multidisciplinary firm Urban Systems. Berris is president-elect of the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects, where her largest initiative to date is serving as the board champion for the Committee on Climate Action. Throughout her long career in practice, academia, and volunteer activities, she has been highly regarded for her unwavering commitment to ethical principles, social responsibility, and exemplary built environments.